Random marathon thoughts: It’s the heat, AND the humidity

Grand Funk members Max Carl (left) and Bruce Kulick (no they’re not original members) play at Sunday’s post-marathon concert in the Alamodome.

Odd and ends from someone who kept track of the Rock ‘N’ Roll San Antonio Marathon from a safe distance (and with a bit of jealousy, since cartilage-free knees keep me from even attempting to walk the half-marathon):

 How’s the weather?: Nonrunners probably don’t understand the griping about the conditions yesterday  mid-60s at the start; approaching 70 degrees by the time the elite runners hit the finish line a couple hours later. To them, it probably felt like a cool, pleasant morning.

The participants, especially the elite, five-minute-mile runners, surely felt it was at least 20 degrees too warm. Add in high humidity, and that makes for some serious pain.

Back when I could run modest distances (the half marathon was as far as my heavy legs ever made it), heat and humidity was a killer combination. Humidity by itself never seemed to be a problem if the weather was cool enough. Yesterday’s 94 percent humidity wouldn’t have been nearly as soul-sapping if the temperature had been closer to 50 than 70.

The one time I ever reached the half-marathon mark in a training run was a cool, windless fall night. The air was so thick with humidity, you could see it glistening in the streetlights, and the temperature was in the upper 40s. The kind of night that makes you feel like you could run forever. Which I did, and my already-wounded knees were never the same.

Anyway… so if you walk outside and it feels like what I call “room temperature” weather  you’re perfectly comfortable walking around without a coat or long sleeves &#151 rest assured runners are gonna think it’s too hot.

 A real hot one: Yesterday’s weather may not have been what runners would have ordered off the menu, but it could have been worse. In the late ’80s, back when the race was just the San Antonio Marathon, I was asked to shoot it for a friend who needed photos for a Texas running calendar he was producing.

Folks who ran that day would have killed for yesterday’s weather. For this race, It was sunny and hot (in November in San Antonio, that’s always a possibility), without much of a cooling breeze to cut the heat.

The scene just beyond the finish line was unforgettable. Having never run anything official longer than a 10K, I was used to seeing lots of folks mildly out of breath and in only minor distress. This looked like triage outside a M*A*S*H unit. Folks were sprawled out in the grass, unwilling or unable to move.

 Got Funk? Glad to see that staff writer Jim Beal Jr. had a wonderful time at the post-race concert featuring Los Lonely Boys, Del Castillo and Grand Funk Railroad (find his report in today’s Metro section). I had been making fun of Grand Funk all week, mainly because the power trio’s popularity in the late ’60s and early ’70s always mystified rock critics. Then I dug into my record collection and found that I owned six  yes six!  slabs of Funk on vinyl, including the still shiny “E Pluribus Funk” in its silver coin package. And that doesn’t count the double album “Grand Funk Live,” which I remember buying but must have gotten melted or something during one of many moves into or out of the UT dorm.